Syrian regime struggles to defeat an insurgency that often slips away, only to resurface

Gunfire and shelling rocked Damascus and its suburbs Wednesday, as Syrian activists reported a widening campaign by the military to sow fear and death in neighborhoods where rebels are strong, and which the government is too weak to fully control.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition group based in Britain with a network of contacts in Syria, said the latest raid in a suburb named Kafar Soussa — with tanks backed by infantry — left at least 24 people dead. In the Damascus neighborhood of Qaboun, activists said, Syrian forces executed 20 others.

Opposition groups described both as “hit and run” assaults. Similar attacks have been reported in several areas ringing the capital in recent weeks, as troops and shelling intensify then fade, as the government kills and leaves: This week activists reported finding 40 bodies in one suburb; last week 60 others appeared in a landfill, many believed to be civilians.

Analysts said the effort — in which the government invades but does not hold an area — underscore the challenge that President Bashar Assad of Syria faces as he tries to defeat an insurgency that often slips away, only to resurface. It is an effort that experts describe as the opposite of the “winning hearts and minds” model, based instead on the Arabic saying “rule is based on awe.”

“Terror is the basic approach,” said Paul Salem, director of the Carnegie Center for the Middle East. “From the beginning of the uprising the logic was hit and hit hard, punish and scare, and that would be the way to do it.”

But he added: “It’s a crazy logic, and it has not served them well.”

While the approach worked when the Syrian government suppressed a revolt in Hama in the 1980s, he said, today’s effort to intimidate the country into calm is increasingly showing signs of failure.

Throughout Syria, the opposition has not broken; it has scattered and regathered. In many areas, from north to south, the government has claimed that its mission was accomplished, or would be quickly, only to have the rebels resurface to fight again with help from the population.

In Aleppo, Syria’s largest city, the government has tried nearly everything, including missile strikes from fighter jets, but while rebel brigades have retreated temporarily from some areas, they have created what amount to formal rotation schedules for others. They have also completed their own successful hit-and-run ambushes on the military airport that is the main base for government troops, and on the city center, while food and other supplies have been provided by wealthy residents.

There are also many areas more distant from the most concentrated fighting where the government’s forces have retreated as rebels make incremental gains.